Friday, September 19, 2008

Brandon Flowers is looking younger and younger with each album, and the rest of the Killers morphing into my mom. Creepy.

Anyway, there's a really good interview in Rolling Stone—and on the mag's site—with Brandon that pretty much tells you everything you'd want to know about the new album.

1. Yes, it's officially called Day and Age.2. Yes, it's out November 25.3. Stuart Price is all over it.4. There are two sax solos.

Here are some excerpts:

So, if Sam's Town is about Vegas, what is this one about?For me it's definitely a continuation. On this one I was thinking more universal. Like, when Morrissey was singing about Manchester, I thought, "I got it." [laughs].I don't know. Maybe I didn't. I feel like that's the duty, I guess. You're supposed to represent where you're from, and—I'm trying to figure out what that is— I don't know how to do it.I don't know.

****

So, and what is Stuart doing to it? He's just shining it up?Yeah, and he's—he's not afraid to put out ideas, and you know at first that was hard to get used to.But I mean some of them we kept, and you know, we almost treated him like a fifth member.

So, for instance, on "Human," what did he add to that?Obviously it has kind of a Euro-pop feel to it.The landscapes —that would be more Stuart.We'd do the meat and potatoes, and he adds the galaxy.

****

What's "Human" about?I think we were at a weird festival in Germany. I was just trying to have it be a simple tune, with classic chord changes. The way I described it to Stuart was -- I remember saying this to him at dinner --"I got this thing, it's like Johnny Cash meets the Pet Shop Boys. Let's go record it."

****

Right. So, what should we say about the other Killers stepping up on this record? I heard five songs and it's definitely the best shit you've ever done. Yeah I feel like it is. I think it was like that freedom that Stuart gives you to just--If you want to try something—to nobody was afraid to try it. We brought in a sax player. Tommy, he's our buddy. He's probably going to come on the road with us. And Ronnie brought in his buddy—this Cuban guy, that's a percussionist. We all just kind of said, you know, fuck it. You know, people laugh at sax solos. We just said, fuck it.

PG, I was actually under the impression that "Human" had leaked and that, as is always the case, I was the last to know about it... glad I'm not completely out of the loop!

Paul, I did, too, and you keep mentioning that you've been listening to Sam's Town, which has prompted me to drag it out, too. Not bad after two years, and sounds better now without all the hype that surrounded it back then.